SwiftVets.com

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THE FOUNDATION

"Newspapers...serve as chimnies to carry off noxious vapors and smoke." --Thomas Jefferson

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INSIGHT

"The hero is the one who kindles a great light in the world, who sets up blazing torches in the dark streets of life for men to see by. The saint is the man who walks through the dark paths of the world, himself a light." --Felix Adler

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IChThUS IMPRIMIS

"We confront a dangerous enemy and it is one which would count the loss of our own freedom as one of its most prized victims. Once more we as a country are called to rise to the challenge in the same way our forefathers were at Lexington, Gettysburg and Normandy Beach, fighting for freedom and liberty -- no doubt most were fortified by a belief in a God who is demanding yet just and merciful. Only time will tell if we are truly prepared to grapple with an enemy driven by the fervently held view of a vengeful, unmerciful Allah, who demands total submission of 'unbelievers,' particularly Christians and Jews." --Paul Weyrich

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FAMILY

"[T]he radical 'pro-choice' crowd is always in attendance at such events [the RNC]. One afternoon, my 12-year-old daughter, Kristin, and I passed a group of protestors that included a boy of about 5-years-old and his mother, both of whom were wearing T-shirts emblazoned with pro-choice messages. Kristin looked up at me in horror and said, 'Gosh, I can't believe that boy's mother is making him wear a shirt that says it would have been OK for her to kill him if she wanted to.' At unexpected moments over the next several days Kristin would bring up the subject again: 'How can we allow such evil, in the United States? How can mothers want to have the right to kill their own children?' These are questions I cannot answer, because I do not understand myself. ... Yet, during the week of the RNC -- with all the forces on both sides of the ideological aisle armed with their most powerful messages and with their most important values on display, my little girl clearly saw the differences between conservative and liberal ideals, and saw her own way through to what is right and just. Would be that others could see it so clearly, too." --Rebecca Hagelin

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CULTURE

"[T]he blogosphere isn't just a challenge to journalism in its currently stagnant state, but a potential boon to problem-solving of a higher order. The beauty of the blogosphere is that it is self-igniting, self-propelling and self-selecting, a sort of intellectual ecosystem wherein the best specimens from various disciplines descend from the ethers, converge on an issue and apply their unique talents. Though virtually newborn, the blogosphere has blossomed exponentially in a matter of Earth-time seconds, from a few random voices to a mighty and diverse chorus of sometimes spectacular talent. Bloggers are the Big Bang of the Information Age." --Kathleen Parker

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LIBERTY

"As I have said time and again, 9/11 changed everything. Everything, that is, except the national Democrats' shameful, manic obsession with bringing down a commander-in-chief. John Kerry has been wrong many times, but he's never been more wrong than in his failure to support our troops and our commander in chief in this war on terror. So, my critics can call me a psychopath and fire spitballs at me and froth at the mouth when an ex-president sends me a nasty letter. That's the freedom of speech they all enjoy, courtesy of the American soldier." --Zell Miller

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THE GIPPER

"This great turn from left to right was not just a case of the pendulum swinging -- first, the left holds sway and then the right, and here comes the left again. The truth is, Conservative thought is no longer over here on the right; it's the mainstream now. And the tide of history is moving irresistibly in our direction." --Ronald Reagan

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OPINION IN BRIEF

"Like swallows heading for Capistrano, liberals are drawn toward those institutions where they have the power to impose their beliefs and ignore any knowledge that says otherwise. Such institutions are usually dominated by the Left. Only belatedly have people with other ideas begun to challenge the liberal dominance in these institutions. Among the fiercest battlegrounds are the courts. Here anyone who challenges the liberal dominance is certain to be not merely criticized but targeted for a whole campaign of smears, a process that put a new verb in our language, 'to Bork.' The Left understands that power trumps knowledge. The question is whether the rest of us will realize that too -- and try to keep such power from becoming or remaining a monopoly of the Left. We don't need limousine liberals telling farmers how to farm, builders how to build, and everybody else how to live their lives. That power is too dangerous to let it trump knowledge." --Thomas Sowell

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GOVERNMENT

"Do you know Congress reported that the deficit for this year is going to hit a record high $443 billion? Now, that pile of red ink is going to be dumped on top of a record $7.5 trillion national debt. And that is a debt that's built on backstabbing, political lies, and Enron-style accounting. You know, 10 years ago, my friends and I ran for Congress to change the way Washington worked. And for a few years, we were the barbarians at the gates of an imperial Congress and we threatened to change that culture forever. But you know what, friends? The sad truth is that Washington won. Washington always wins. And those same barbarians turned into the palace guards, drunk with power and indistinguishable from those people they hoped to replace. And you know what? In the process, the party of Reagan became the party of big government, as it became harder to tell any difference between Capitol Hill Republicans and Capitol Hill Democrats. Why? Because, in the end, most seem more interested in keeping power there than in saving America." --Joe Scarborough

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BUSH CAMPAIGN JOURNAL

"As George W. Bush mounts a strong comeback in the polls, stock market averages are mounting their own stealth recovery. There's a clear link here. Should the president be reelected, tax-rates on capital will stay low and may even drop some more. Wall Street likes this. Bush's concept of tax reform is focused on reducing the multiple taxation of saving and investment. Under current law the same dollar of income is taxed once as work effort, a second time as corporate earnings, a third time as dividends, a fourth time as capital gains, and a fifth time as inheritance. This is a capital killer. Without capital there is no investment funding for the very businesses -- large, small, old, or new -- that create jobs. Levying tax penalties on capital, as Sen. John Kerry would do if elected, would curtail the supply of the very seed corn necessary to grow the American economy. Capital is labor's best friend. JFK understood this, but his Democrat party has long since forgotten." --Larry Kudlow

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JFK DEMO-LITION DERBY

"Kerry also is a casualty of nuance-itis, which is a kind of house mold prevalent in the north wing of the Capitol. Senators -- unlike governors, who often sharpen issues -- are forever blurring things to manufacture legislative majorities. Partly for that reason, senators rarely become presidents. Regarding Kerry's reticence about his Senate years, Grover Norquist, head of Americans for Tax Reform and a colonel in conservatism's infantry, has a theory. It is that Kerry is crippled by having spent his Senate years as a moon orbiting Ted Kennedy's sun." --George Will

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RE: THE LEFT

"If the election were held today, John Kerry would lose by between 58 and 100 electoral votes. The reason is simple: the central vulnerability of this president -- the central issue of this campaign -- is the Iraq War. And Kerry has nothing left to say. Why? Because, until now, he has said everything conceivable regarding Iraq. Having taken every possible position on the war, there is nothing he can now say that is even remotely credible. If he had simply admitted that he had made a mistake in supporting the war, he might have become an antiwar candidate. But having taken a dozen positions, he has nowhere to go." --Charles Krauthammer

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POLITICAL FUTURES

"Ever since the first cries of 'quagmire' back in the early days of the 2001 Afghan liberation, the left has been trying to Vietnamize the war on terror. They failed on terror, but they did Vietnamize the election campaign, and that's turned out just swell, hasn't it? Remember that formulation a lot of Democrats used last year? They oppose the war but 'of course' they support our troops. John Kerry's campaign is a walking illustration of that straddle's deficiencies: When you divorce the heroism of soldiering from the justice of the cause, what's left but a hollow braggart?" --Mark Steyn

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FOR THE RECORD

"Terrorists don't care who you are, or where you come from, with whom you're aligned, or not aligned. Terrorists have killed rich and poor, those who represent countries fighting terrorists and many more who want nothing to do with terrorists. It doesn't matter. Neutrality doesn't protect them. Wealth doesn't save them. They are all targets. We are all targets. It's hard to think about making money when you're burying a son or a daughter, a mom or a dad. No, saying 'it's the economy, stupid' is like shouting to the world that you really are stupid. I'm happy more of the jobless are finding jobs. I'd just be a lot happier if more of the terrorists were losing theirs." --Neil Cavuto
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Link to -- http://FederalistPatriot.US/current2004a.asp